Debt and Paradox in the Early Modern Period

This chapter examines some rhetorical paradoxes from the early modern period involving debt and argues that they are supported by deeper logical paradoxes. A rhetorical paradox gives arguments for an intuitively repugnant conclusion, leaving the audience in a dilemma. A logical paradox suspends a reasoner between several inconsistent but equally valid answers to a question. The concept of debt and related concepts, particularly the concept of a continuous self, readily give rise to logical paradoxes, which rhetorical paradoxes exploit in order to drive us towards counterintuitive conclusions.